Fair use

Last updated 23 October 2026.

Sidedoor's free pack lets you try a real search before you pay. It costs us real money to run, so it comes with a few rules. They exist to stop people collecting free packs, not to get in the way of anyone using Sidedoor normally.

One free pack per person

• Each person can have one free pack, once. It follows you, not the exact email address you type: common variants of the same mailbox (for example Gmail with or without dots, or with a "+" tag) count as one.
• If you sign up again from the same browser or device as an earlier free pack, the new account is linked to the earlier one and starts without a free pack. You can still use it, and buy a pack once buying opens.
• A busy shared network (an office, a campus, a mobile carrier) can see several free packs before we treat new sign-ups from it as linked. If you were caught by a limit you didn't cause, email hello@sidedoor.ing and we'll sort it out.

Real email addresses only

Sign in with an email address you can actually access, or with Google. Throwaway and disposable email services are blocked.

Limits that protect the service

• Daily limit for free packs. Free packs share a daily limit. On a very busy day, a new free search may have to wait until the next day to start. Paid packs aren't affected.
• Free searches build in stages. A free search shows the jobs we already know about straight away. Its full search for the recruiters in your field starts when you come back to it, or when you star a job.
• Activity limits. Paid actions (like job lookups) are limited per account and per network per hour and day, so one account or one network can't overload the service.
• API keys come with paid packs.

Don't try to get around the limits

Don't rotate email addresses, run automated sign-ups or scripts, or disguise who you are to get more free use. We may link, limit or suspend accounts that do.

What we keep, and for how long

• To apply these rules we keep the email address each free pack was given to, for as long as that rule applies (so the same person can't have a second one).
• When you use Sidedoor we see your network address. We store only a scrambled (hashed) form of it, never the address itself, and remove it after 30 days.
• We set one strictly necessary cookie that identifies your browser to us (for these limits and to keep you signed in). Clearing it doesn't reset the one-free-pack rule. We don't use advertising or analytics cookies.
• Sign-up and sign-in may include a quick automatic check that you're a person (Cloudflare Turnstile). It doesn't ask you to solve puzzles.

More on how we handle your information is in our privacy policy, and the rules for using Sidedoor are in the terms. Questions: hello@sidedoor.ing.